4 Tips To Keep In Mind When Picking A Child Care Provider For Your Child
Finding the right child care provider for your child is an important choice, especially when your child is young and not able to speak up for themselves. When looking for a child care provider, it is important to follow your instincts and to pay attention to the details. When visiting child care providers, here are four things that you should look out for and inquire about.
How The Caregivers Interact with The Children
The first thing that you should pay attention to is how the caregivers are interacting with the children when you visit. Are they kneeling or sitting so that they are down on level with the children? Are they on the ground playing with the children? Are they sitting down to eat with the children?
You want to choose a child care facility where the caregivers are getting down on the children's level to interact with them. This shows personal engagement and a degree of warmth that your child needs. You don't want caregivers that are detached and don't interact on a one-on-one basis with your child.
How Clean is the Facility
Next, pay attention to how clean the facility looks and how clean the facility feels. Can you see where they keep the cleaning supplies? Do they clean and disinfect the facility with bleach?
When you look at the toys and furniture, do they look like they are cleaned on a daily basis or do they look dusty? Are they well taken care of or are their toys present that look dangerously worn down?
Young children play a lot on the floor and touch everything and put a lot of the things they touch in their mouth, so you want a clean facility for them.
What is the Facilities Teaching Philosophy
There are lots of different philosophies on how to raise and treat children. Be sure to ask questions about the facilities teaching philosophy and make sure that it lines up with your own. For example, if you want to raise your child with Christian values a Christian preschool, like Champions Christian Academy, could be a good option.
Be sure to get specific when you ask about their philosophy so you can understand how it is acted out within the facility. A motto is one thing; how they run their facility is another.
What is their policy for feeding children? What is their policy for putting kids to sleep? What is their policy for dealing with misbehavior? How do they encourage growth in the children in their care? The answers to these more pointed questions will really show you how they enact their philosophy in their child care center.
When looking for a child care facility for your young child, make sure that you find one that gets down and interacts on level with your child, is clean, and aligns with your parenting philosophy and beliefs.